Hi - this is Srinivasan Sampathkumar from Triplicane. I have a passion for Marine Insurance, Cricket and of course Temples especially Thiruvallikkeni.
From Sept 2009, I am posting my thoughts in this blog ; From July 2010, my postings on Temples & Tamil are on my other blog titled "Kairavini Karayinile " (www.tamil.sampspeak.in)
Request you to keep providing your feedback which will help me improve and present better.

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

From Thiruvarangam temple, Rockfort temple and more – you have so many
landmarks – yet, next time you are at Trichy, do visit this memorial on the
Collector Office Road. We have
seen Cine heroes donning role of Army Jawans and applaud them too (the stories of
dons too become big hits !) – that is tinseldom – in real life there are
some real heroes !! In our history books,
we have read about 3 battles of Panipat, Plassey, Arcot and more …..will we
ever read of Tololing or Kargil ! ~ on
every 26thof July, it
is our duty to remember those brave souls.

This famous son of the Nation hailed from the tiny island of
Rameswaram. His father Lt. Colonel Adi
Mariappan died in a road accident in Bangalore on 1989 while serving in the
Indian Peace Keeping Force during Operation Pawan in Sri Lanka. He reached
bigger heights, literally. Acting Major
Saravanan, the hero led a small assault group when he fell," sources say. Major M Sarvanan, the hero of Batalik, led a
platoon up the Jubar Hills on May 29. While he was able to take back two
bunkers the rest of Jubar Hills was under enemy control. One of the platoon
members accompanying Maj Sarvanan and the only one to survive the attack, was
Naik Shatrughan. He was hit on his legs three times and it took him ten days to
crawl back to base. He gave the unit the information of how Maj Sarvanan died
after killing at least four of the enemy in hand-to -hand combat. Naik
Shatrughan later died in the field hospital because of gangrene. Maj Sarvanan possibly
was the first officer to fall in the
Kargil conflict. The attack led by him came in the early stages of the conflict
when adequate information was not available. There was little artillery support
and no aircraft cover. Nation's third highest wartime gallantry award VIR CHAKRA was
awarded to Major Mariappan Sarvanan on 15th August 1999.

July 26 is Kargil Vijay Diwas ~ a day to remembered
by the Nation. 17 years ago, this
beautiful landscape was the site of a bloody war that claimed the lives of
hundreds of soldiers from India who fell fighting valiantly and killing
Pakistani intruders. Kargil war came to an end on July 26, 1999
after India took over command of the outposts from the Pakistani intruders and
wrested Kargil back from their hands. Seventeen years ago, Kargil happened in
the backdrop of an outstanding peace initiative by the then prime minister Atal
Bihari Vajpayee who went to Lahore and held talks with his counterpart Nawaz
Sharif. The apparent bonhomie between the two leaders could hardly conceal the
underlying rancour of the Pakistani Army which had launched a secret operation
occupy glacial heights and cut off the Indian supply route after Zozilla pass
in the Himalayan hill.

The capture of Tiger Hill signalled India’s victory in the short
but sharp war between India and Pakistan over the icy heights of Kargil. It
came at the end of a three-month-long battle .
The ‘intruders’ had the advantage of height and fired artillery shells
with precision. The men on the ground finally realised the ‘rats’ were not
ordinary infiltrators but trained Pakistani army regulars who had set up
bunkers and dug their heels in for a long haul.

Kargil War was fought on the high glaciers of Himalayas
between May and July 1999 –Tiger Hill or Point 5353, a mountain in the
Drass-Kargil area of Jammu & Kashmir, India was the subject of the most
famous battle. WAR is never to be craved for, it causes innumerable and
irreparable losses to both the warring sides. But no Nation can afford to
forget the sacrifices of its warriors. Kargil has lessons for both,
India and Pakistan. The peaks of Tololing and Tiger Hill once reverberated
in Indian news etched in history. India would remain a peace loving
Nation having good relationship with its neighbours but should remember that
there are military adventurist army driven Nations who have the propensity to
engage in conflicts notwithstanding any episodic peace rhetoric. The
Nation needs to remain prepared and strong militarily and in terms of civil
defence measures but should not never get buoyed by war calls- and the following read in the
Facebook page of Indian Army Fans is worthy of reading again and again.

If you can't be a Soldier, help a Soldier. If you can't
fight at the border, fight the chaos in your neighbourhood. If you can't nurse
a soldier's wound, wipe the tears of his family members. If you can’t feed a
soldier, pray he sleeps indoors tonight. If you can’t thank him personally,
thank his parents. If you can’t help him get back, make sure his body gets
home, with all due respect and much more. If you can’t be a soldier, thank them
everyday. If you can’t be a soldier, encourage your child to be one. If you
can't be a Soldier, learn to atleast respect one.

Today, is the time, we remember the martyrs of Kargil.
Jai Jawan, Jai Hind………